


Going For It

by robotguts



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anxiety, Canon Trans Character, F/M, I have no idea how long this will be, References to Underage Smoking, Smoking, Texting, they're both nervous as hell but lup is better at hiding it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-07
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-10-29 05:31:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10847463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/robotguts/pseuds/robotguts
Summary: Modern AU. Lup's had a thing for Barry for a while, but she never expected anything to actually come of it, you know?Barry, on the other hand, has decided to never take advice from Taako ever again.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Alright. I've finally worked up the nerve to post something on ao3. Cool.
> 
> ...I'm terrified.

Lup gets the first texts as she steps into her apartment building.

 

**_Barry:_ ** _Hey! I was wondering if maybe you wanted to get dinner some time._

**_Barry:_ ** _I know we’ve gotten dinner together before dozens of times but I mean like. As a date. Not as two friends getting food together._

**_Barry:_ ** _What I’m trying to say is: would you like to go on a date with me? I probably should have led with that._

Standing in the hall, she watches the little ‘this person is typing’ bubble pop up and disappear for a few minutes before it stops completely. She grins, unconsciously but bright and wide, for a moment. _What a dork._

 

Then, without warning, she starts to feel a knot of nervous tension gripping at her stomach.

 

The apartment is quiet when Lup gets inside, which means Taako definitely isn’t home yet. Any minute now, she figures. She heads to his room and digs a carton of cigarettes out from under his bed. He won’t miss them, she figures. Neither of the twins have smoked regularly in years—not since they were shitty teenagers. Taako probably would’ve thrown the carton away, if he ever threw _anything_ away.

 

He won’t mind, she decides. This is a special occasion. Or maybe it’s a very mild and entirely unwarranted panic attack. She isn’t sure which. She hears her phone’s text alert again, but can’t bring herself to look.

 

She stuffs one of the three remaining packs into her jacket pocket and unceremoniously drops the carton, kicking it back under the bed.

 

Once she is in her own bedroom, settling into the thin section of floor between her bed and the wall. She pull a single cigarette from her pocket and digs around in the drawer on her bedside table for something to light it with. She finds a box of strike-anywhere matches, half a dozen cheap Bic lighters of various colors, and an engraved zippo she’d gotten as a gift from an ex.

 

She settles on the matches, striking one on the thick rubber sole of her boot. After she lights the cigarette, she lets it burn until it almost singes her calloused fingertips before sharply shaking it to put out the flame. She takes a long, slow drag and ignores the dull burn in her lungs.

 

_I’m being stupid_ , she thinks, _why am I so freaked out about this?_

She gets another text and still doesn’t check her phone. After leaning over to crack open her window, Lup flicks the ashes from her cigarette into a mostly-empty can of Cheerwine that’s been sitting on the bedside table for three days.

 

Distantly, she hears the front door open and slam shut again.

 

“Lup! You home?” Taako yells. Lup doesn’t even have time to respond before he flings open her door and flops dramatically onto the bed. Taako is too long to fit sideways on her twin-sized bed, so most of his body ends up draped over either end.

 

“What’s wrong with you?” he asks, studying his sisters face for a moment.

 

“Nothing. All good.”

 

“B-ull-shit,” Taako says, repositioning himself face her fully, “You’re curled up in the floor smoking _my_ cigarettes—don’t lie, I know they’re mine. You haven’t bought smokes since, uh, probably since we needed a fake ID to buy ‘em. What is it?”

 

“It’s nothing.” Lup stuffs what’s left of the cigarette into the can.

 

“Horse! Shit!” Taako tells her, just as her phone’s text alert sounds again, “We short on rent again? ‘Cause Merle owes me like fifty bucks and—“

 

“—No! It’s not like that.”

 

“What’s it like, then?”

 

Lup groans, “You’re not going to leave me alone until I tell you, are you?”

 

“Nah.”

 

Lup realizes she’s probably giving too easily, but she knows her brothers game. The more he has to work at getting her to talk about it, the more shit he’ll give her for it. It’s too late to hope he’ll decide to mind his damn business.

 

“It’s just,” Lup rakes her fingers down her face, groans with stifled annoyance that she even has to have this conversation, “Barry asked me out.”

 

“Oh shit!” Taako laughs, smiling like he knows something she doesn’t, “What’d you say?”

 

Her phone dings.

 

“Therein lies the fucking problem. I haven’t said anything.”

 

“Oh. Shit.” Taako’s knowing smile fades into something like worry.

 

“Mmmhmm.”

 

“Listen, if you’re not into him like that, just tell him. Or, hell, I’ll tell him for you. Whatever you need me to do.” Taako pulls himself off the bed to sit beside her.

 

She sighs, “That’s not the issue.”

 

“No?”

 

“That’s, uh. That’s the exact opposite of the issue I’m having here.”

 

“Not sure I follow,” Taako says.

 

“I like Barry, alright? A lot. I’m _into_ him, if you need me to put it that way,” Lup closes her eyes and leans heavy on the wall behind her, “It’s just… What if it doesn’t work out?” She and Barry had spent the better part of a year and a half spending time together, with her attraction as a slow-building undercurrent. The knowledge that the attraction was mutual? It was exciting, but ultimately unstable.

 

“Well, if you’re asking for my advice—”

“—Kinda wasn’t, but go on—”

 

Taako rolls his eyes, but continues, “I say go for it! Like, god forbid something _nice_ happen for once. Get it while the get-in’s good, I say.”

 

“And that’s easy for you to say. You’re still trying get with a dude who almost got you _arrested_.”

 

Taako stands up, “A. He didn’t almost get me arrested, alright? And 2. All the more reason to hop on the Barry train while you got the chance. This is a much safer bet.”

 

“Right. I’ll keep that in mind.” Lup tells him, as she’s waving him out of the room.

 

“You do that,” Taako says, needing to get in the final word, “Oh, and stop stealing my shit.”

 

Lup waits a moment, until she can hear her brother digging around in the kitchen cabinets, before she checks her phone.

 

The messages from Barry were a few variations on ‘no pressure and also feel free to ignore these messages entirely if you want.’

 

The last message isn’t from Barry at all.

 

**Merle:** wht r u and bluejeans talking about?? i think hes hyperventilating

 

Well, Lup thinks, at least the two of them were on roughly the same page. She slowly, carefully types a response out to Barry.

 

**Lup** : Hey! Sorry! I got distracted and forgot to text you back.

**Lup** : Lmao dinner sounds great. Name a time and place. :’)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't like how this turned out but here it is!
> 
> Barry's POV of the last chapter, in case that isn't clear? I really hope this makes sense. 
> 
> Warnings for this chapter: Very, very mild drug references.

_Pan’s Garden_ isn’t really the sort of place that Barry ever imagined he’d spend most of his free time—the odd, out-of-the-way little place was half florist and half head shop.

Merle is behind the counter when Barry gets there. Which should be surprising—he owns the place, after all—but Barry was _sure_ Lup was supposed to be working today. Barry had been using the greenhouse behind Merle’s shop as a makeshift lab for nearly two years now, it was inevitable that he’d eventually memorize his friend’s work schedule.

“Where’s Lup? Did she get sick or something?” he asks, now worried, “Doesn’t she close on Wednesdays?”

“Yeah, but she’s not sick or nothing,” Merle sniffs, flicking absent-mindedly at the Willy Nelson bobblehead beside the register, “Sent her home early. Visit with my kids fell through and I needed the distraction.”

“…Oh. Shit. I really wanted to talk to her.” Worry fades to disappointment. It must show clearly on his face, because Merle seems to take immediate offence.

“Well, sorry my presence is such an _inconvenience_ to you,” Merle says, now picking at a fraying seam on his gaudy Hawaiian shirt, “You know, I’m doing you a favor by letting you use my greenhouse for your weird science shit. Wouldn’t kill you to be a little nicer.” He looks hurt, honestly hurt.

Barry sighs, steps forward and places his hand oh Merle’s shoulder, “I’m sorry, Merle. I didn’t mean to—” 

“—No, no! Go on, do whatever it is you do out there. Weirdo black magic shit, I swear.”

Barry lets his hand fall away slowly as he heads outside, “Listen, I’ll be outside, if you want to hang out?”

The area behind Pan’s Garden hadn’t been properly maintained in months—an overgrown mess of tall grass, wildflowers, and weeds. Barry takes a seat at the picnic table where he and Lup usually spent her lunch break, and thinks hard about what he intends to do next. Usually, he’d head over to the greenhouse to check up on things but, if he’s being honest with himself, there’s really nothing that needs checking on. He’d just stopped by to see Lup.

In a roundabout way, he could blame this whole thing on Taako.

_‘Just go for it! Ask her to dinner or some shit.’_ Taako had told him, the last time Barry managed to speak to him alone. (He and Taako had a more group-setting sort of friendship.)

That… hadn’t been the expected response.

He’d gone to Taako for a dose of reality. He’d expected Taako to sit him down and tell him that his crush on Lup was a lost cause, never gonna happen, _get over yourself Barold, she wouldn’t be caught dead._ Taako wasn’t exactly known for sparing feelings, he had none of Magnus’ unshakable optimism or Merle’s blind-spot for romantic attraction, and he knew Lup better than anyone. But that’s not what happened. Taako had _encouraged_ him.

If _he_ said Barry had a shot, it must be true. Right?

Barry realizes, faintly, that if he waits much longer he’ll lose his nerve.

So he takes out his phone and types a message out, deletes it, rinses-and-repeats for what feels like the better part of twenty minutes.

He closes his eyes and hold his breath for the moment that he finally hits ‘send’, but he’s done it. He asked Lup out to dinner.

Then, he starts to over-think it. _We go to dinner all the time. What if she’s never thought about me like that? Why would she assume I meant a date?_ So he sends another text, just to clarify. (And then another, to be completely sure.)

He’s a bit surprised when he gets no immediate response, Lup usually held onto her phone like a lifeline—a side effect of often being called into sort out the aftermath of her brother’s antics—and typed faster than anyone else he knew.

He stares at the messages he’s already. Barry had an ex who told him that double-texting was annoying. She told him this a lot, especially when he started getting panicky and irrational. Barry lies his head down against the table, picking anxiously at the peeling paint as he wonders if maybe that’s why Lup isn’t answering. He was being _annoying._ (The obvious reasons come to mind too: Maybe she just _hasn’t_ seen the messages yet or maybe that she just needs time to think about it, but Barry’s brain has to play through every terrible possibility before he can settle on the rational ones.)

Barry hears the back door to the shop open and shut, but he doesn’t look up. Merle clears his throat and he grumbles back at him in acknowledgement.

“You, uh, you alright, kid?” Merle asks, taking up the seat across from him.

“I’m fine,” Barry lies, now raising up just enough to look at him.

“Oh-kay…” Merle doesn’t believe him for a second, he can tell, “Seriously, what’s going on with you?” he asks, just shy of disinterested.

Barry rubs at his temples in an attempt to stave off his growing stress-headache, “I took some advice from Taako,” he tells him, not really prepared to share the full situation the way Merle clearly expects him too.  

Merle laughs, straight-up slaps his knee like that’s the best thing he’s heard all day, “Why the hell would you do something like that? You know he was probably fucking with you, right?”

“I- …Because I’m an idiot.” Barry plays through his last conversation with Taako in his head, wondering if his encouragement may have been part of an elaborate joke, maybe sarcasm that’d gone right over Barry’s head.

“Aw, no,” Merle leans in to pat Barry on the shoulder. He’s not sure if it’s meant to be condescending, “You’re not a idiot. Gullible as shit, sure, but not an _idiot_.”

Barry feels his throat tighten up with worry, and he wonders how he could have ever thought this was a good idea. How could he be so _stupid?_

For a few long moments, Barry is silent. He glances over at the greenhouse and thinks about all the weird little projects and probably pointless research that he and Lup had started there out of the simple drive to know more, all the things he couldn’t—and wouldn’t—finish without her. He thinks about Lup’s gentle teasing, and he thinks about never hearing it again. Thoughts rush in and out of his head too quickly to process properly. He is, he realizes, panicking a little.

He grabs for his phone and types another message, this time begging Lup to just forget the whole thing. Then another. Then, he hears Merle grumble something under his breathe about being ignored and stomp back into the store. Lup had become a constant in his life, one of the very few good ones, and now he faces the possibility that he may have damaged it beyond repair. Unrequited feelings he could handle, Lup’s friendship was more than enough, but couldn’t handle the idea that he’d made it _weird_.

Then, he finally gets his response.

**Lup** : Hey! Sorry! I got distracted and forgot to text you back. 

**Lup** : Lmao dinner sounds great. Name a time and place. :’)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback would, of course, be lovely! Thank you!
> 
> Find me on-  
> Tumblr: @Robot-guts  
> Twitter: @r0botguts
> 
> Next Chapter: The date.

**Author's Note:**

> Up next: Barry's side of this whole thing. 
> 
> (Feedback would be absolutely lovely. I have no idea if this is even worth continuing??)


End file.
